SC stays arrest of Gugnani brothers

The Supreme Court has stayed the arrest of Gugnani brothers, the accused in Punjab Technical University distance education scam, till further orders.

Ajesh Gugnani, Sanjeev Gugnani, Rama Gugnani w/o Sanjeev Gugnani and two other employees of the Matrix Infosys Gautam Banerjee and Sabal Kanta, were booked by the Kapurthala police on October 23, under Sections 420 (cheating and dishonesty), 406 (criminal breach of trust), 467 (forgery of valuable security), 468 (forgery for the purpose of cheating), 471 (using a forged document as genuine), 506 (criminal intimidation) and 120-B (punishment of criminal conspiracy) of the IPC on the complaint filed by PTU Registrar HS Bains.

A local court had also initiated proclamation proceedings against Gugnani brothers and three others as they were evading arrest, hampering the inquiry proceedings, in the hope to get relief from Punjab and Haryana high court and later from Supreme Court.

Gugnani Brothers were provided interim relief by Punjab and Haryana high court on November 25 but the court later cancelled the relief during hearing. A vacation bench of the Supreme Court passed the order on June 10, asking the state government to file its reply on the writ petition of Gugnani within four weeks and had put a stay on the arrest till further orders.

Gugnani brothers were allegedly running an organised racket by using malpractices in distance education examination and were found guilty by Punjab Technical University for charging fees more than prescribed norms both from the students as well as the learning centres.

The Gugnani brothers, through their companies, have been controlling the administration of PTU learning centres in 14 states across the country.